Fresh and Exciting

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

What I find most objectionable and hard to grasp is why this series feels it's necessary to pass off heavy scripting as reality. Do they think their audience is made up of complete morons? They must, because they're constantly trying to pull the wool over the eyes of reality TV viewers. It's really bad enough that their business model is more of a modus operandi wherein they lie straight faced to customers about the monetary value of items they purchase. But it's WORSE that those 'customers'are, in reality, only shills and actors, friends of the cast and so on. They don't even own the antiques that they purport to be selling. It's absurd. And.totally unnecessary, as well. I'll stick with my Antiques Roadshow, now in their billionth season on PBS. They don't pee up my leg and tell me it's raining!

This show consists of folks coming into the Obscura antique store in the East Village in New York. Sometimes they come to sell something, sometimes to buy or sometimes in search of something illusive--but ALWAYS it's weird and often twisted.I've seen this show a few times already, but my daughter just saw it tonight. I think her reaction is the typical sort of reaction anyone would have if they give the show a chance. When the show began, almost immediately some sick and weird items began showing up in the Obscura antique shop. She said "Oh, my gosh!"--and was shocked. BUT, when I started to change the channel she told me to wait! She was hooked...almost like someone watching a train wreck! Fascinating and creepy, this is sort of like "Pawn Stars" for Wednesday Addams! Cool...really, really cool. Oh, and by the way, sometimes the people coming to the store are a lot weirder than the stuff the place sells!!

"I have a hard time trying to communicate with people...skateboarding's a way for me to communicate..." -Mark Gonzales, Professional SkateboarderEven though the above quote was written by an athlete, I think it fits the theme of the show quite nicely. "Oddities" is a series that centers around an antique store that buys and sells, just that, oddities. Strange medical equipment, and all other manners of macabre artifacts come into and out of the shop, and that alone is interesting, but what I think makes the show unique, and compulsively watchable are the people both in front of and behind the counter.The owners are passionate about their work, and it brings them into contact with many people. Whether it be authenticators, hobbyists, buyers or even the occasional lawyer, they're always treated kindly and professionally. They're not just buying and selling, they're communicating their passions.The show does the same thing. A lesser show would consider some patrons as eccentrics, but this show takes a higher stance and presents them as individuals, not making a point of their uniqueness, but not downplaying it either. I think the subtext is that, in a way, we're all "Oddities", along with the things we love.While I do have some reservations about this program (back-to-back episodes can get repetitive etc) I think this show is up there with a lot of the better Discovery Channel Series' (and general TV documentaries) and I really hope it gets the audience it so richly deserves.